There's a note on the bed!  It's not a fun note.  It's been left because the palace can no longer afford to post a Security around just to brief Sevar when she wakes up.

Nidal has by now confirmed, despite some halfhearted initial attempts to conceal this fact, that every day Cheliax's best fighters come back and Nidal's fighters don't; which is to say that every day makes Nidal weaker and leaves Cheliax largely unchanged.  Nidal's position may not be good, right now, but it sure isn't getting any better.  They've done the reasonable thing and launched a massive but hopefully doomed counterattack with all of their forces, including the immortal Black Triune caught halfway between life and undeath, the three of whom have ruled Nidal unchanged since the beginning of the Age of Darkness eight thousand years ago.

Aspexia Rugatonn is on the front lines.  So is Abrogail Thrune.  So is anyone who can teleport.

With Nidal's god sealed, Asmodeus backing up Rugatonn almost directly, Nidal's aggressive posture forcing it to attack into prepared Chelish positions, and the massively greater resources of Cheliax, this battle is a foregone conclusion; or at least, hopefully so.  But Rugatonn casting that Forbiddance is going to need to wait.

Sevar is advised to prepare whatever counterspells she can, and whatever escape-with-Keltham magic doesn't fit into counterspells.  If Sevar has to do any fighting today, it will be with the remaining people in the palace casting resistances on her, trying to take hits for her, and her job is second of all to counterspell whatever's left and first to escape with Keltham.

There's a bag of Holding with a few resources along the lines of various resistances scrolls, limited-charge invisibility items, that sort of thing.  Obviously she shouldn't use those unless she has to.

There's no Teleport scroll listed in the bag's contents; maybe somebody doesn't feel like pushing their luck.  Today would be a great day to escape with Keltham to another country, get an Atonement to Lawful Neutral, and tell him the truth about everything, if one actually wanted to do that.  Does Carissa, by any chance?

No! Carissa is a loyal Asmodean and her country is at war against Zon-Kuthon. She has a feelings problem, not a 'desertion in wartime' problem, and not a shred of sympathy for people with the latter problem. She's going to do her fucking job, which is apparently preparing a lot of Dispel Magic and Invisibility and Alter Self. And she's going to go find Keltham first, so that if anything moves on the palace she's already with him. 

Keltham, at least, still rates a Security to guard his room.

Keltham has been told that there's a huge Nidal push, not told that it's one that probably ends the war either way, but absent the push it seemed hard to explain conditions in the palace otherwise without lying.

Keltham asked if people dying in Nidal go to Zon-Kuthon's afterlife to be tormented even with their god sealed; was told probably in that person's guess, but all the expert clerics are out.

Keltham developed a concentrated look and requested to be left completely alone to think for 3.2 hours.  He's writing notes to himself in cipher and has tapped himself with an Owl's Wisdom once, after which he spent some time crying and then continued writing.  Everyone who could safely read his thoughts might as well be on the remaining moon.

- okay Carissa is actually more concerned about that than about the war with Nidal. It is to a first approximation impossible to predict where Keltham will land after three hours of thinking with some Owl's Wisdom thrown in; she should have been woken the instant he ordered that. (Of course, they might need her spells, which complicates that call, but.) How long has it been.

The Security - who is not, incidentally, wearing an intelligence headband - says that he didn't know the spell was that important?  People do that the first few times they get tapped with Wisdom.  There's also nothing they can do about it, or so the guy thought?  They can't read his mind and they can't use mind control either.

He's got 1.3 hours left on his original request.  Half an hour ago he peeked out to ask for food and if the literal actual Imperial palace had any real books on agreements between gods, and was told maybe possibly but it's not the best time to ask.

They can wake up Carissa is what they can do about it. It is not their job to know what spells are important, it is their job to report to people who do know anything at all about anything. Is Maillol on this or did they send him to the front. 

He's at the front.

(And likewise, it's obvious at this point, are nearly all of the actually competent Security people.)

Yeah she's getting that sense. 

Fine. "I assume you have continuous eyes on him? Tell me if he moves at all."

She parks herself outside Keltham's door. Slips a note under it that says awake - want to help - please let me in as soon as I can be helpful. Carissa.

Preps spells. Mostly the ones recommended for escape with Keltham, though she squeezes out an Invisibility for an Owl's Wisdom of her own. She might need it.

Ten minutes after she slips her note, the guy says, "He's moving towards the door."

This is because Keltham is slipping a note back out under the door, apparently.  The note says I will.

There's a feeling that this project has very thoroughly acquainted Carissa with. It's the 'Asmodeus is giving unAsmodean orders' feeling, or the 'this random escort to my cosmetics appointment is a minor noble and a fifth-circle sorcerer' feeling, or the 'Aspexia Rugatonn is pretending I'm important' feeling. It's that she's missing something, something big, and her thoughts are trying very hard to stretch their theories over that gaping maw of confusion when instead she should  -

"I want a precise transcript of the conversation earlier with the idiot who told him Zon-Kuthon's people are probably being tortured forever, and I want his ciphered writing handed directly to Hell as fast as that can be achieved with current resources, and I want to hear about anything he does, even if it is stupid, even if you cannot think of any possible reason I would care."

She continues prepping spells, though, because unless and until she's prepared to walk into Keltham's room it's better to have them. 

Transcript:

Keltham:  With Zon-Kuthon sealed, are people aligned to him in Nidal, or people who - did Zon-Kuthonish things, however that works - are they still going to his afterlife and is it still awful?

Security:  (pause)  You want a priest of Asmodeus, fifth-circle or higher, to even have a chance of answering that one correctly, and everyone like that is at the front.

Keltham:  What's your guess.

Security:  ...probably?

Keltham:  Thank you for guessing.

Ciphered writing:  En route.

After Carissa is done prepping spells, she's handed a war update by a Security who looks actually competent, why, he's even wearing an intelligence headband.

Aspexia Rugatonn is dead at the hands of the Black Triune, all scries on her soul have failed, presumed destroyed somehow.  This is apparently an event some helpful people were kindly waiting for; multiple ninth-circle and eighth-circle casters not aligned to Cheliax, including at least one completely unidentified such ninth-circle caster, have now moved to engage the Black Triune and their supporting top casters.  All Chelish forces in the vicinity are getting the hell out of their way, 'pursued' by Nidal forces that can't do much without their top casters.  Cheliax's remaining top casters are likewise not engaging, and letting these helpful newcomers have all of the remaining fun.

No, she thinks, very very stupidly.

No, see, that's not allowed. 

They need to take this report back and bring her a better report, one in which something better happened. 

She doesn't spend all that long being an idiot; she can't afford to. 

The other gods were of course not maneuvering for Cheliax to conquer Nidal. They don't want that. They permitted Nidal, for thousands of years. They were maneuvering for the war between Cheliax and Nidal to weaken both, enough that they can then sweep in and -

If Carissa was in charge retaliatory assassinations of everyone in charge of every other country around would now be in the works. But that's not her job. Her job is Keltham, and -

- and she's just going to open his door. He can hit her about it if he likes. She can excuse it with how she was so very sad, Keltham, fix it. Fix it somehow. 

(Can he?)

(Can a Civilization as great as his, but with magic - with clever ideas for Wish wordings -)

Keltham looks up from whatever he's writing, startled before he clamps down on the expression.

"Orders or situation report?" he says, sounding like he's trying to sound calm about it.

"I don't know what your last situation update was. Nidal launched a massive attack on the border and it's probably going to end the war one way or another. The Grand High Priestess - you met her briefly, she was the elderly lady in the throne room - is -"

" - gone. Not dead, gone. There's - other countries involved now - it'll probably be over pretty soon -" She's going to go in for a hug. "Keltham -"

Apparently Carissa Sevar knew Aspexia Rugatonn personally, and is totally fine with Keltham knowing this?  At least, that's what you might think if you were a Security watching all this happen.  You would probably also be thinking something about pathetic attachments and incredible unprofessionalism.

He hugs her; it feels a bit different.  "I think," Keltham says, "that everyone involved in this entire war may have been very, very stupid, on account of gods not actually being able to talk to anyone, at all, even when they communicate, for some reason they're not allowed to say -"

"Can you get me somewhere that someone can summon a lantern archon for me, like the place we first arrived here."

Yep, shit, something is wrong. 

His god talked to him. 

The obvious thing. Wait until almost everyone is gone, and then tell him -

It might be time to transition to plan: go with him. She doesn't have a fucking Teleport scroll. They might literally be able to buy one in Egorian. Too implausible? No, because he knows Cheliax is presently weakened and disorganized, his god would have told him that.

" - not allowed to say what? We're supposed to stay in this hallway, right this minute, if Zon-Kuthon has the resources to attempt another assassination it's not going to be easy to drive them off."

"This seems actually important and time-sensitive even by my standards.  And I don't think Nidal actually knew where I was, and now Zon-Kuthon is sealed."  Keltham turns to the Security wearing a headband.  "I'm exercising my right to leave Cheliax at any time.  Take me to where I first arrived here.  I'll hang out there to see if anybody comes by to pick me up, or, you know, anybody passing by happens to summon a lantern archon for me, whichever comes first."

No.

Trips, at once, all of her - sense that she's missing something ENORMOUS, swinging around reaching for -

Why, if he's doubting everything, would he trust in his right to leave Cheliax at any time.

...because Abadar told him that was real. May, in fact, have been the one who guaranteed it in the first place.

Message. 'your god's sending someone, aren't they'

"Carissa, what the fuck -"

"Would you please consider staying here until we at least have somebody to cast the lantern archon spell immediately?" says the Security who's actually wearing an intelligence headband.

Voice in Sevar's ear, presumably a Message:  "Sevar, pull yourself together RIGHT THE FUCK NOW, stop thinking about Rugatonn, figure out some way to recover from that fuckup, don't think about anything else that might be happening, you better believe that if we fuck this up the Queen will turn all of us into statues."